


Shout

by scribaversutus



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel (Comics)
Genre: Abuse, Child Abuse, Clintasha - Freeform, Deaf Character, Deaf Clint Barton, abuse cw, deafness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-05
Updated: 2015-03-05
Packaged: 2018-03-16 10:49:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3485432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribaversutus/pseuds/scribaversutus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You never know what will set it off.  A bar brawl, coming a bit too close.  A fist made at you from a stranger, or someone you trust.  A shout you didn't expect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shout

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS DARKFIC. If you don't want to see Clint upset, DO NOT PROCEED.  
> (That said, nearly everything I write has some hope in it and this is no different, so the ending isn't too bad.)
> 
> Set in Fraction's Hawkeye after Clint is deafened.

“Forgive me if my moral compass isn’t quite up to your standards, _Captain_ ,” Natasha hissed furiously. “Forgive me for choosing to _live_ when my only options were kill or be killed.”

Clint Barton was used to people swinging by his apartment. The door was rarely locked, a fact that Kate and Jessica and pretty much all the Avengers knew and took advantage of frequently. What he wasn’t used to was two people in a full-blown shouting match bursting through the door mere feet from where he was standing.

“But those aren’t your only options now, and that’s the issue!” Steve thundered. “We could have gotten some good intel from those guys, but you had to fly off the handle - _again_ \- and now we’re back to square one!”

Caught completely off guard, Clint flinched backwards – hard. As his hands reflexively came up to shield his face, the mug he’d been holding spun to the ground and shattered.

Two heads whipped towards the sound, silence falling so quickly that they could hear the last drops of coffee hit the floor. A second passed, two, three. Steve was the first to move. Knowing how sensitive the situation was, he walked towards the shaking archer with abundant caution, hands raised and open and voice low, approaching him like he would a wounded animal – or a scared kid.

“Hey, Clint, I’m sorry. We both are. We didn’t think about… we didn’t realize you were down here. We should have left our baggage at the door. Won’t happen again. You okay there, buddy?”

Automatically scanning with near-frantic energy but finding no real threat, Clint started to come back to himself. Straightening back to a normal standing position, he looked down at the shattered mug on the floor.

“Aww, that was one of my favorites!” he said, trying to grin but failing miserably. Grabbing a dustpan and broom from the corner, he ignored the concerned looks on the faces of both Avengers, preferring to try and sweep the mess up again. Instead, he found that his hands were still too unsteady to rely on, the tremors in them shooting more than one shard of ceramic across the floor. _Dammit. Damn it all._ On the verge of a breakdown he wanted nothing to do with, Clint focused on the broken mug until it felt like nothing else existed – which just made him feel worse. There was nothing left but little pieces, impossible to put back together. It felt like some sick metaphor for his life. Trying harder and harder to sweep it up, Clint didn’t notice the vibrations of footsteps until Natasha was crouched in front of him, steadying his hands with hers and sweeping all the shards together into the dustpan. Dumping it all in the trash, Nat returned to his side and tapped his knee until he looked at her. Her face, he noticed, didn’t contain the pity he was expecting but a look that was more pain than anything else. 

_I’m so sorry,_ she signed, _that was incredibly stupid of us. Of me. We’ll keep it elsewhere next time or give you a warning, I promise._

Nodding slightly in response, Clint was already turning away when her hand caught his shoulder, pulling him back around to face her.

_Hey… you’re not alone in this. I know there are things you don’t want to talk about and that’s fine, but anytime you need to get something off your chest, no matter what it’s about… I’ll always be here for you. I’ll be whatever you need, just say the word.”_

Natasha moved closer, bumping his shoulder with hers and maintaining that contact until he leaned back into her. Hearing rather than seeing Steve retreat from the apartment, she knew Clint had felt him go too when he turned into her and held her tightly, hot tears dripping onto her shoulder as the archer let himself go. The two of them stayed there until it was over, him holding onto her for dear life and her patting him on the back, running her hand through his hair until he began to calm down and pull away from her. Standing up, she gave him her hand to pull him up and retrieved some Tylenol from a cabinet, figuring he was going to have a killer headache after a cry like that. Handing the pills to him, she waited until he’d swallowed them and turned back to her, then started signing again. 

_I’m serious, Clint. You and I are in this together, all the way. Whenever you want to talk about it, I want to listen._

Eyes swollen, he stood in place for a moment and considered her words before reaching for the almost-full coffee pot and pouring a cup for each of them. 

_Here,_ he signed, _you’ll need this._

Visibly steadying himself as he took a sip from the mug, Clint gathered his thoughts for a moment before launching into his story. His past had haunted him long enough; it was time to exorcise the demons. 


End file.
